<html><HEAD><TITLE>Strange case of the American Taliban fighter</TITLE></HEAD>
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<b><A HREF="index.htm">HOME</a> > <A HREF="jihad.htm"> JIHAD</a> > AMERICAN</b>


<H3>Strange case of the American Taliban fighter  </H3>

(For more on this case, see the website <A href="http://www.talibanjohn.info/">Taiban John Info</A>)


<P>KABUL (Reuters) - A 20-year-old American who fought for the 
Taliban and survived a bloody prison uprising near the northern 
Afghan city of Mazar-i-Sharif last week said his heart had drawn 
him to the hardline Islamic movement.
<P>
<IMG SRC="walker.jpg" alt="John Walker" hspace=10 HEIGHT=170 WIDTH=212 align=left>

``I was a student in Pakistan, studying Islam and came into 
contact with many people connected with Taliban,'' John Walker 
said in an interview shown on CNN television on Monday. He was 
being held by U.S. forces in northern Afghanistan.
<P>
``I lived in the region, the North West Frontier Province (of 
Pakistan),'' he said. ``The people in general have a great love 
for the Taliban so I started to read some of the literature of 
the scholars, the history of Kabul ... my heart became attached 
to that.''
<P>
A spokesman for U.S. Central Command, which is running the 
military campaign in Afghanistan, confirmed that a man who said 
he was an American was in the control of U.S. military forces.
<P>
``Military forces in Afghanistan do have in their control a man 
who calls himself a U.S. citizen,'' Marine Major Brad Lowell, a 
Central Command spokesman, said.
<P>
``He was among the al Qaeda and Taliban prisoners; he was held by 
the Northern Alliance in Mazar-i-Sharif. He is injured and is 
being given medical assistance by U.S. forces,'' Lowell told 
Reuters.
<P>
The CNN clip showed the man appearing dirty, with a long beard 
and grimacing as if in pain as he answered questions from a 
stretcher.
<P>
He was described by Newsweek magazine's Web site as ``a white, 
educated-sounding, apparently middle-class American'' who 
identified himself as Abdul Hamid. It said he was taken into 
custody on Saturday at a hospital where he had been taken for 
treatment of minor gunshot and shrapnel wounds.
<P>
Hamid was identified by his parents as John Phillip Walker Lindh, 
of Northern California, according to Newsweek.
<P>
His parents told Newsweek they had contacted officials at the 
State Department and the U.S. Embassy in Pakistan but had 
received no information.
<P>
SAW PHOTO ON INTERNET
<P>
Marilyn Walker said on Sunday that the photo of her son that 
appeared on Newsweek.MSNBC.com was the first indication that she 
had had of his whereabouts since he left a religious school in 
Pakistan's Northwest Frontier Province, where he had been 
studying the Koran, seven months earlier.
<P>
John Walker, who uses his mother's last name, told Newsweek he 
had traveled across the border to Afghanistan to help the Taliban 
build a ``pure Islamic state.'' He told CNN he had gone to the 
Afghan capital, Kabul, and volunteered to serve the Taliban.
<P>
Because he did not know the local languages, he said, the Taliban 
told him to contact forces supporting Osama bin Laden. He said he 
received combat training at a camp in Northern Afghanistan, 
fought with Pakistani allies of the Taliban in the disputed 
region of Kashmir and then returned to fight recently with the 
Taliban at Kunduz, Afghanistan.
<P>
John Walker was born in Washington in February 1981, Newsweek 
said. He is the second of three children of a home health care 
worker and a lawyer, Frank Lindh. His mother said he spent the 
first 10 years of his life in the Washington suburbs of Maryland, 
moving to Northern California in 1991.
<P>
John's father, Frank Lindh, who is divorced from Marilyn Walker, 
said that his son took to Islam naturally. ``I support him and 
his studies,'' Lindh said. ``He's learned Arabic and is 
memorising the Koran. He's a very good scholar.''
<P>
Marilyn Walker said she was shocked by her son's statements of 
support for the Taliban and bin Laden. ``If he got involved with 
the Taliban, he must have been brainwashed,'' she told Newsweek. 
``He was isolated. He didn't know a soul in Pakistan. When you're 
young and impressionable, it's easy to be led by charismatic 
people.''
<P>
The parents said they did not know if he would be charged with a 
crime but would stand by him.
<P>
Referring to his son's study of languages and dedication to 
religious studies, Lindh told Newsweek: ``I'm proud of John. He's 
a really good boy. A really sweet boy.''
<P>
NO COMMENT ON LOCATION
<P>
The special forces soldiers who detained Walker took him aside 
for treatment and later left with him, doctors told the magazine. 
A Northern Alliance military source said the U.S. soldiers had 
taken him to Mazar-i-Sharif, Newsweek said, adding that U.S. 
forces refused to comment on his whereabouts.
<P>
Walker told Newsweek earlier he was a Washington native but 
indicated he grew up elsewhere in the United States. He said he 
converted to Islam at the age of 16 and later went to Pakistan to 
study the Koran, Newsweek said.
<P>
Walker said he came into contact with Taliban teachings while 
studying in Pakistan and traveled to Afghanistan six months ago 
to help ``because the Taliban are the only government that 
actually provides Islamic law,'' the magazine reported.
<P>
He fought with the Taliban at the siege of Kunduz in northern 
Afghanistan and surrendered along with hundreds of other fighters 
after the two sides negotiated a deal.
<P>
He was later transferred along with hundreds of other prisoners 
to Qala-i-Jhangi fortress west of Mazar-i-Sharif, where a revolt 
broke out a week ago. The uprising was violently put down by U.S. 
warplanes and Northern Alliance ground forces.


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<P><font size=1>Posted January 2002. 
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